The present invention relates generally to methods of displaying data, and more particularly to methods of displaying electronic program guide (EPG) data in a grid format.
Generally, as used in this application, xe2x80x9ccontentxe2x80x9d refers to the substance or material being viewed or heard, such as an actual TV program, movie, etc. The content is typically identified intuitively by title, such as Seinfeld, Gone With The Wind, etc., and this type of identifying information is referred to as xe2x80x9ctitle-basedxe2x80x9d information. This is to be distinguished from information that identifies the physical hardware characteristics of the location or source of the information, including but not limited to channel, frequency, track, CD slot, etc. Though the two types of information (title-based versus source-based) are generally mutually exclusive, there are situations where they may overlap. For example, phrases such as xe2x80x9cFOX Newsxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cChannel 11 Newsxe2x80x9d do in fact contain source-based information, but the phrases are generally considered title-based, because a viewer would use such a phrase when referring to the content of the program, to distinguish the program from other news broadcasts. Basically, the identifying information in the title of news programs is generally an indication of the actual source or channel of the news, because xe2x80x9cnewsxe2x80x9d would not in and of itself convey to a user which news broadcast the title xe2x80x9cnewsxe2x80x9d would be referring to.
The concept of title-based information, along with associated benefits of its use such as xe2x80x9ctitle-based direct access controlxe2x80x9d, are discussed in more detail in the above-referenced related applications, and particularly in the ""873 application. For ease of reference, however, xe2x80x9ctitle-based direct access controlxe2x80x9d may be briefly described as the ability of a viewer to choose entertainment content by directly selecting the title of the desired content, as opposed to having to select based on source-based criteria such as channel.
Also as used in this application, the terms xe2x80x9cuserxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cviewerxe2x80x9d, and xe2x80x9cconsumerxe2x80x9d are used interchangeably depending on the context, to refer to a person using the methods and devices described herein. A xe2x80x9clogical userxe2x80x9d may be a single user, or a group of users having shared or aggregated program preferences. For example, xe2x80x9ckidsxe2x80x9d may be a logical user, for which program preferences are determined by a parent. Or xe2x80x9ccritics"" choicexe2x80x9d may be a logical user, for which program preferences are determined by a group of program critics. Or xe2x80x9cdefaultxe2x80x9d may be a logical user, for which program preferences are determined by a predetermined or random algorithm.
xe2x80x9cProgramxe2x80x9d is used to refer to a television broadcast program, satellite broadcast program, cable broadcast program, or any other program that is generally scheduled to begin airing at a predetermined time, and air for a predetermined time, as determined by the program content provider. A program is said to air substantially continuously for a period if it airs during that period without interruption by any other scheduled program. This is despite interruptions in the program due to commercials, news flashes, or other temporary and/or unscheduled events.
xe2x80x9cDisplayed periodxe2x80x9d is used to refer to the time that is represented on the axis of a given display. For example, if the given display showed program content airing from 11 am to 1 pm, then the displayed period is 11 am to 1 pm.
xe2x80x9cCellxe2x80x9d refers to a logical space in a logical grid. Thus, a logical grid merely defines the logical boundaries that separate the logical cells. It is common in the art to physically represent a logical grid by a series of intersecting vertical and horizontal lines, which delineate columns and rows. Typically, the physical representations of the horizontal lines, which typically delineate channels, are complete, while the physical representations of the vertical lines, which typically delineate time boundaries, may be discontinuous due to programs that span across more than one continuous cell within a single row. A cell holds program description or program content information such as a title. The program description or program content information may comprise a title, a graphic representation of the program content, or any other descriptive information to convey at a glance the actual program content referred to. A single cell, or a group of continuous cells within a row, is also referred to sometimes as a xe2x80x9ctime slotxe2x80x9d within the given row, because generally the horizontal axis on the display grid represents time.
The traditional method of displaying TV program information for multiple TV channels is to show a grid with the time of program on one axis (typically the X-axis), and the program""s channel on the other axis (typically the Y-axis), with program content displayed in the associated cells that represent the intersection of a time""s column and a channel""s row. This is a natural way to organize this information for the traditional control procedure, wherein the user presses numbers on a TV remote controller that correspond to the channel for the desired program, or changes through neighboring channels sequentially using the channel xe2x80x9cupxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cdownxe2x80x9d buttons until arriving at the desired channel. Thus, identification of the TV channel carrying a desired program is necessary to locate the desired program for viewing, whether from broadcast, cable, satellite, internet video, video on demand, or other distribution mechanism.
However, channel numbers are not the most intuitive decision criterion in determining what to watch on TV. That is, viewers typically do not determine that they want to watch channel 87, and then tune to channel 87 and watch whatever is there. Instead, viewers typically determine the content of what they want to watch, usually based on title such as Seinfeld, Gone With The Wind, Wheel of Fortune, etc., or at least they choose a category of entertainment such as drama, comedy, suspense, etc. The primary and most intuitive criterion for deciding what to watch is thus program content, and only after viewers decide which program content they want to watch, does it become important to know on what channel that content is available. Knowledge of the channel is needed to view the desired content because viewers must send commands to the TV or other device indicating on what channel the desired content can be found, so that the tuner can tune to the desired channel.
Thus, it is more intuitive for viewers to see, browse, select, and perform other functions using title-based information, than to do the same functions using source-based information. Additionally, it is beneficial for the title-based information to be sorted by category or other similar factor, so that the overall view of information identifies the content of each program, and also groups programs of a similar category together. In general, the grid format can be used to present information such as EPG data in this manner, allowing the viewer to see information about multiple programs simultaneously in a manner that is intuitive and easy to work with.
Websites are available that present TV schedule information, and include the content category information in some way. For example, http://www.excite.com (xe2x80x9cEXCITExe2x80x9d) shows grid listings with programs in different categories shown in different colors. EXCITE, however, displays the program information using traditional time/channel axes.
Complete application programs downloadable to a PC are also available, which present TV schedule data in the traditional grid format (plus colors for categories as with the website grids), and which further allow sophisticated user searching for specific programs, actors, etc. For example, http://www.tvhost.com (xe2x80x9cTVHOSTxe2x80x9d) allows the user to see programs listed in very specific categories (e.g. subcategories of sports such as xe2x80x9cGymnasticsxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cLive Horse Eventxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cMotor Sportsxe2x80x9d etc.). TVHOST, however, also displays the program information based on channel, and merely provides simple vertical lists of programs giving time, channel, and program title on each line.
Another known website, http://www.theGIST.com (xe2x80x9cGISTxe2x80x9d), attempts to organize TV schedule information in grids that are grouped according to categories. FIG. 1 illustrates one such grid, G1, displaying xe2x80x9cComedyxe2x80x9d programs. (For convenience, xe2x80x9cGxxe2x80x9d, where xe2x80x9cxxe2x80x9d is a number, is used herein to refer to the grid of FIG. xe2x80x9cxxe2x80x9d.) In FIG. 1, it can be seen that the information still follows the time/channel layout necessitated by the traditional TV control mechanisms as discussed herein. This leads to empty cells or gaps 5 in the schedule, where the channels listed in the rows are not airing program material in the xe2x80x9cComedyxe2x80x9d category at the time indicated by the associated column.
Thus, the prior art method of organizing TV schedule grids does not use display space efficiently when showing program information sorted by category. For analytical purposes, the amount of wasted space using the prior art method may be calculated by abstracting away the stylistic elements, and even other factors for which correction techniques are known in the art, and then analyzing only the logical structure of the grid as will be described herein.
Referring to prior art grid G1 of FIG. 1, the stylistic elements include the title bar and time slot identifier rows, 10 and 15 respectively, as well as particular font types, font sizes, cell size, screen size, etc. By eliminating all stylistic elements, various display methods may be compared based on their actual display efficiency.
One measure of display efficiency is to compare, for a given amount of program information (x), the number of cells needed in a first grid to display the information, versus the number of cells needed in a second grid. This measure is referred to herein as cell-reduction percentage. If P represents the number of logical cells in the first grid prior to performing truncation or compaction methods described herein, and Q represents to the number of cells in the resulting second grid after performing the truncation or compaction methods described herein on the first grid, then the cell-reduction percentage of the second grid from the first grid is (Pxe2x88x92Q)/ P. As an example, if a first grid has 100 logical cells, and after applying the methods described herein the resulting grid has only 90 logical cells, then P=100, Q=90, and the cell-reduction percentage of the second grid from the first grid is (100xe2x88x9290)/100 or 10%. That is, the truncation methods would have eliminated 10% of the logical cells from the first grid.
Another measure of the benefits of the present invention is known herein as representational efficiency. This is a measure for a single grid, and is represented by dividing the amount of information represented in the grid by the number of logical cells used. Thus, using the same example grids as above, the representational efficiency of the first grid is x/100, and that of the second grid is x/90. Converting from the first grid to the second grid would thus provide an improvement in representational efficiency of (x/90)/(x/100)=100/90. In ratio form, this equates to 1.11 to 1. As can be seen, the formula for improvement in representational efficiency when comparing two grids can be stated simply as P/Q.
The significance of measuring efficiency at the logical level will be apparent from the examples and discussion that follow. The two formulas just described, cell-reduction percentage and representational efficiency, provide alternative views of measuring the desired efficiency.
In practice, it is worth noting that cell size and font size in EPG grid displays are generally chosen such that each half-hour time slot is at least wide enough to convey basic program identity in the majority of cases. Additionally, it is known in the art to lessen the amount of wasted vertical space in certain situations by merely truncating text. Thus, as seen in FIG. 1, the vertical space 20 required due to the program title listing xe2x80x9cMovie Movie . . . xe2x80x9d 25, and the vertical space 30 required due to the xe2x80x9cWGNSAT 24xe2x80x9d source-based identifier 35, may both be reduced by merely truncating the associated texts so they occupy only a single line. This is done, for example, in the on-screen TV grids displayed on the PreVue channel.
Turning back to grid G1, when it is reduced down to its logical structure for analytical purposes, the result is grid G2 as seen in FIG. 2. As can be seen in grid G2, many gaps 5 still remain, taking up precious screen or display space on an EPG display. In addition, the entire first column 40 is devoted to merely conveying channel information, which as discussed herein is unnecessary in a system that implements title-based direct access control. In total, the 5-column, 13-row grid G2 contains 65 cells, only 32 of which contain program content information. Thus more than half of the logical space of grid G2 is wasted.
The inefficient use of display space is a shortcoming for any system that aims to convey large amounts of information quickly and easily. For any home that receives more than twenty channels of TV programming, displaying the program contents for those channels requires the representation of large amounts of information, which requires efficient display usage even on a full-sized personal computer screen or a large TV screen. However, it is especially important to use display space efficiently when presenting information on a small screen, or on a TV screen viewed at normal viewing distances. For these types of display devices, including hand-held devices which necessarily require relatively small screens, the inability to display category-sorted program information efficiently is a severe drawback.
Methods and devices that overcome the above-mentioned deficiencies in the prior art would thus be desirable, to enable viewers to view a larger amount of category-sorted and/or title-based information on a display such as a hand-held EPG display, by eliminating unnecessary gaps in the display.
The present invention relates generally to methods of displaying data, and particularly to methods of displaying EPG data that is sorted by category or is otherwise limited to selected programs, such as only black and white movies, only movies released within a certain date range, only programs with specified audio characteristics, or any other criteria. Program content information is displayed with improved efficiency of display space use. Since title-based direct access control renders sorting by channel unnecessary, the logical program content information in grids that do not use channel as an axis may be compressed into a much more efficient space, instead of leaving gaps at locations representing time slots wherein a particular channel is not airing a program of interest. The amount of program information that can fit on a given display is thereby increased. This is especially useful with systems having relatively small display areas, such as the hand-held devices described in the ""873 application and in the ""841 application.
In its simplest form, the methods of the present invention involve eliminating the program channel column 40 of a prior art grid such as grid G2, and packing program information from multiple programs originating from multiple channels into single rows. In one embodiment of the present invention, the horizontal axis of the grid represents time, but the vertical axis is unused. In this embodiment, the program information may still be arranged vertically according to a criterion such as a user-preference ranking, TV rating, or any other selected characteristic or preference. In another embodiment, the vertical axis is used to represent program categories. Prior art methods of representing TV schedule grids do not do this, because without title-based direct access control, it would be extremely confusing and non-intuitive for a user to access a desired program. With title-based direct access control, however, this method provides an easy, intuitive, and efficient way to view EPG data sorted by content-based criteria that are meaningful to each individual user.
In addition to removing source-based information as an axis, various truncation algorithms, some of which are known in the art, allow for the elimination of even more potential gaps in the EPG display. For example, a first technique, (a), is used to truncate the program description when the program description cannot fit completely within its associated logical timeslot due to the number of characters, graphical icons, etc. associated therewith. A second technique, (b), is used to xe2x80x9ctruncatexe2x80x9d a timeslot when a program""s actual timeslot covers a period not within the displayed period. This would occur, for example, if a program that aired during a part of the displayed period either: (1) began during a time in the displayed period and ended at a time beyond the displayed period; or (2) began at a time not in the displayed period and ended at a time in the displayed period; or (3) began at a time not in the displayed period and also ended at a time not in the displayed period.
Both techniques (a) and (b) are known in the art, but have been used only with grids utilizing time/channel axes. Additionally, these techniques are used only after program descriptions to be displayed are assigned to their respective cells. These techniques then merely determine the actual text to be displayed in those cells. These techniques do not consider whether program information for a particular program may be displayed in a cell other than the cell to which it has already been assigned. Thus, neither technique (a) nor (b) directly affect reducing the number of logical cells required to present a given amount of logical information. Instead, they both involve merely taking program information for particular programs assigned to particular cells, and determining the actual text to be displayed in those cells.
The techniques of the present invention, on the other hand, directly concern reducing the number of logical cells in an EPG grid. They allow for program information for a particular program to be placed in any one of many available cells in the EPG grid, thus providing more flexibility in the overall arrangement of how the necessary information will be displayed. One of these techniques, (c) is used when there is a program X in the grid on a first line with at least one gap, and there is another program Y in the grid on a second line, where Y spans a time slot that corresponds to at least one of the gaps on program X""s line. In that situation, either X""s title, Y""s title, or both can be truncated, and Y""s title can be moved to X""s line. The result is that program title descriptions for multiple programs from multiple channels appear on the same line. This is not feasible with grids using time/channel axes, due to the requirement in such grids that each entry on a given line must air from the same channel.
Another technique, (d), of the present invention, is used when there is a program X that runs for an extended period of the day, representing xe2x80x9congoing contentxe2x80x9d, such that the exact start and end time of the program adds little or no value to an EPG display. Its listing in a category-oriented grid may be truncated at start and/or end as needed, to allow its placement in any available empty cell or cells.
Another aspect of the present invention involves using the techniques described above to present EPG data for multiple categories on the same display.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will be apparent from the detailed description which follows, when read in conjunction with the associated drawings.